We’ve discussed the concept that inner ring suburbs like Millcreek are in the early stages of what could be a long decline.

And that trend is not unique to Erie if you take a look at a really interesting discussion on the New York Times’ Freakonomics blog.

The item talks to several planners who say that American suburbs are facing an almost inevitable decay.

That decay is being exacerbated by rising energy costs.

It seems that it was easy for folks to afford back yards and commutes into the city when energy prices were lower. That’s not so easy now.

Now the good news: some thinkers believe smaller cities like Erie stand to benefit from this trend.

Writes author James Kunstler:

We face an epochal demographic shift, but not the one that is commonly expected: from suburbs to big cities. Rather, we are in for a reversal of the 200-year-long trend of people moving from the farms and small towns to the big cities. People will be moving to the smaller towns and smaller cities because they are more appropriately scaled to the limited energy diet of the future. I believe our big cities will contract substantially — even if they densify back around their old cores and waterfronts. They are products, largely, of the 20th-century cheap energy fiesta and they will be starved in the decades ahead.

If Erie can transform its core into an attractive setting for people to live, work, and play, it stands to see a renaissance as this trend unfolds.

Of course, it will have to be smart about how it uses its resources and it will need some smart entrepreneurs who will invest.

But the conditions are ripe.

I wish I could be quite as optimistic about the future of places like Millcreek.